


Offside

by SomethingProfound



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: F/F, Football | Soccer, Friends With Benefits, Friends to Lovers, Mutual Pining, National Women's Soccer League, Past Abuse, Women's Professional Soccer, because beau's dad is a dick, it's the soccer au you've all totally been waiting for, the vox machina girls show up because I needed more players tbh, they're part of the orlando pride because it's the gayest team
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-11
Updated: 2018-06-11
Packaged: 2019-05-20 19:36:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,702
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14900684
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SomethingProfound/pseuds/SomethingProfound
Summary: There's plenty of people who've told Beau her whole life that she's gonna fall flat on her face. She's too angry, too sarcastic, too bitter. Joke's on them, though, because she has a professional contract and plenty to prove on and off the pitch. And sure, her teammate is really, really, really, really attractive, but she's got this. Yeah.Soccer!AU with two disaster gays.





	Offside

**Author's Note:**

> So I'm writing this instead of hard sci fi, so...
> 
> Big thanks to folks on Discord who let me ramble on about the AU to them. Y'all are great.

Her first day wearing purple and Dairon had already handed Beau a long list of fucking rules. “Train hard, don’t get into bar fights, and I’ll play you and keep the media out of your way.”

Beau looked from the list to the slight woman lounging across the teak desk from her. “This is…long.”

Dairon smiled slightly. “Follow them and you might play. Don’t and you’ll sit in the reserves the whole year. I want your fire, Beau, but I want it on the field, not before match tribunals.”

She wasn’t kidding. Beau had slouched into her meeting with her new couch and told her where she could put that smoke she was blowing when she broke out that Lifetime movie motivational speech. Dairon had metaphorically laid her out - unlike anything Xeenoth had managed to do before he’d finally washed his hands of her - and despite herself Beau felt the kindling of grudging respect flaring in her chest.

“…I might play?”

“Yes,” Dairon said matter-of-factly. “I am paid to win matches. You’re used to being the best player on the field. That’s not going to be the case here. You’re in the top tier league in the country, perhaps in the world now. You’ve got lots of potential but you’re not going to run rings around defenders like you did in college. My plan is to give you minutes off the bench this season and introduce you to the starting XI next season. Train hard, play hard, and you’ll get your shot. Don’t throw this opportunity away.”

Beau shifted. “Yeah, alright.”

“And Beau?”

“Yeah?”

“Don’t read the articles on us signing you.”

She shrugged, mouth twisting with a smirk. “Used to people saying shit about me. I can deal.”

Dairon’s gaze was disturbingly penetrating. “Maybe you can, but you’re here to play football.”

“Got it.”

“Know where the changerooms are?”

Beau knew a dismissal when she heard one and got to her feet, slinging her gear bag over her shoulder. “Yep.”

It was after she walked out of Dairon’s office that she realised that she had absolutely no idea where to go. The hallways were all smooth and identical, marked here and there with the Orlando Pride crest. The crest. The same one on the shirt she was wearing, the one they’d gotten her to wear for the ‘Welcome to the Pride’ photos. And okay, the crest maybe looked a little like a nipple. But she was a fucking professional soccer player now! For a good team! They weren’t Portland, but a good team. She fist pumped in the empty corridor. Take that, career counsellor who’d laughed at her saying she wanted to play for a career. Take that, ‘Beauregard ha too much attitude to make it’.

Okay…she really needed to find the locker room. She walked around the corner, looking in vain for a sign or a map - seriously was that so much to ask for? - and straight into about six feet of solid muscle. She practically bounced off, already scowling - and then looked up into mismatched eyes and the glare slid right off her face. Oh. Oh shit.

“Shit. You’re really tall.”

One eyebrow lifted. Beau wondered if it was possible to sink into the floor. The other woman’s hair was long, dark and thick, hanging in braids down her back, pale arms rippling with muscle revealed by the tank top she wore. She could probably life Beau over her head or something with those arms.

“So I get told.” Tall, Dark and Fucking Hot dropped her eyes to the shirt Beau was wearing. “You’re Beauregard, the new striker.”

“Uh. Yeah. Well, just Beau is fine, yeah? You’re Yasha, the goalkeeper.” And even hotter in person than she was on tv. “Great saves, by the way, last year, in the quarter final.” Orlando had crashed out of the play offs to Chicago the year before - but not due to Yasha’s goalkeeping. She’d pulled off heroics to keep them in the game, but in the end it hadn’t been quite enough.

Yasha frowned slightly. “I guess. We’ll do better this year.”

“Yeah, yeah, totally.”

Yasha looked her up and down, and Beau straightened despite herself. They were close enough that she could see a little scar on her chin. “Looking for the locker room?”

“Uh…”

“It’s alright. This place is something of a maze to begin with.” Her voice was so soft, compared to her size. She followed her in mute silence through the complex to the locker room. It was currently full of twenty or so women laughing and chattering as they changed into their training uniforms. Beau froze. She didn’t do so well with…people. You got this. Fake it until you make it. Yeah. Her case wasn’t helped by Yasha immediately pulling her shirt off, revealing a very impressive set of shoulders.

“Beaaauuuuu!”

“Oof!”

All the air was driven from Beau’s lungs as Jester Lavore slammed into her and arms her torso in a hug so tight she was pretty sure she heard her ribs creak.

“Heeey, Jester.”

“I am so glad you are here, Beau! I was so excited to hear that they were signing you!”

Another squeeze. Beau hid a wince. “…I’m really happy to see you too.”

“Do you have a place to live yet?”

“Uh, not yet. Still in the hotel right now.”

Jester smiled at her blindingly, hands still clutching Beau’s arms. She was in her training uniform but only one cleat. “You could stay with me! I have plenty of room and we could be roommates!”

“Yeah!” It was easy to be excited when Jester was.

“Jester,” a gentle, amused voice and a hand on the shorter woman’s shoulder. “Please go put your other cleat on.”

Jester pouted. “But Beau is here!”

“I know, but we’re starting training in ten minutes and Beauregard still needs to get changed.”

“Fiiiine.”

A tall blond in her early thirties smiled at Beau extending a hand to shake. Allura fucking Vysoren. Awesome. “I’m Allura, the team captain. Good to have you with us.”

Like Beau wouldn’t know who she was. Though she guessed there was no way that wasn’t mortifying to admit to someone that you used to buy their USWNT jerseys and had a poster of their wife on your wall as a kid.

“Thanks. It’s good to be here.” And she found she did feel excited to be here.

“You and Jester know each other?”

“Yeah,” Beau shrugged, “We played in the national under 17s together.”

“I heard that you have the record for the most under 17s red cards.” There was a glitter in Allura’s eyes.

Beau winced. “Yeah.”

Allura looked resignedly at the ceiling. “You and Kima are going to get along way too well.”

“What’s that?”

Beau tried to nod coolly at Kima Vord. Who was just as short and solidly built as she looked on tv.

Allura caught Kima’s wrist. “Nothing, darling. Beau, don’t listen to a thing Kima tells you.”

“What?” Kima began, only to be dragged off by Vysoren.

“See you on the pitch!”

“Allura-”

Towards the end of the session Beau felt exhausted and prickly. There were just so many names to learn and people surrounding her that she had to try and be polite to, and cameras going off in the stands from the handful of journalists and photographers present. She found herself clenching her jaw as she exchanged passes with Lyra, one of the other forwards.

“Hey, Beau!” Fjord, a tall attacking coach who was both disgustingly handsome and charming, called over to her in his rolling Texan.

“Yeah?”

He pulled her out of the line. “I’d like you to do some 1 v 1s, alright? Give us an idea of where you’re at. You’re fast, so we want you getting in behind defenders and into those positions, after all.”

“Yeah, sure,” she shrugged carelessly.

“Yasha!” Fjord jogged over to get the goalkeeper set up in the net.

God. Was she even taller? Yasha seemed to gill the goal, gaze hard and fierce. Right. Ignore the hot goalkeeper. She was the enemy right now. Beau totally had this. She was good at this whole deal. Ball into the back of the net. Simple.

Except it wasn’t, not when Yasha seemed to read her mind. She knew when to come off her line to scoop the ball up from Beau’s boot, when to jump to deal with a chip.

_C’mon!_ Frustration burnt clear in her stomach. She charged forward, eyes fixed in front of her, the ball a blur.

“Don’t look at her! It’s just you, the goal and the ball!” Fjord shouted from the sideline. Don’t look at her? Had the guy seen her?

She lifted her head and put her boot through it, all thought fading away except that clear, strong image of the far post upper corner. The net bulged as the ball slammed in, just centimetres from Yasha’s outstretched fingers.

“You nearly got that,” Beau wondered out loud. It was the best shot she’d made in a while. Almost perfect. Right into the corner. And Yasha had almost saved it with a crazy jump. “Guess that’s what they mean when they call you ‘explosive’ huh?”

Yasha picked the ball out of the net, holding it between her hands and stepped closer, a little smile on her lips. “I’m really fucking strong.”

Beau let her eyes wander. “I can see that.”

When she met her eyes again, there was a faint dusting of red across Yasha’s cheekbones, but she didn’t step back.

“Good job,” Fjord interrupted. “You did really well today, Beau.”

“I barely scored on her!” She complained. Yasha was already walking off, pulling her gloves off and flexing her fingers.

“Yasha is one of the best keepers around,” he reminded her, “Don’t be too hard on yourself. Hit the showers. Coach will wanna talk to the team, then I’m pretty sure Jester’s been talking about how she’s going to show you around town all week.”

She still wasn’t quite sure why Jester liked her so much, but it was difficult to say no to her. So she gave Fjord a thumbs up and trudged wearily towards the locker room.


End file.
